Draft:Meme art

Definition

Meme art is a subset of contemporary art that selects its aesthetics, themes, and strategies from internet meme culture as well as related forms of digital folklore. Internet memes are defined as cultural artifacts (most often images, short videos, or phrases) which spread online through imitation and remix^[2]

Meme art encompasses digital works (like image macros, reaction images, remixed screenshots, looping GIFs, short-form video, and copypasta) along with painting, sculpture, installation, and performance that interpret meme formats and their circulation in other media.

History and Context

As memes have become a modern form of expression, debates have emerged about whether or not they should be considered art ^[3][4] Proponents argue that in their role as an expression of thoughts and emotions, memes should be considered art, while critics suggest that the low amount of effort and creativity that are required for memes to be made preclude them from being considered art, and that their mass reproducibility did not allow them to be art in the same way as traditional mediums^[5]

These debates were compounded by the emergence of NFTs, which implemented elements of traditional art, such as ownership and monetary valuation as a signifier of legitimacy, onto art that only previously only existed in the digital space,^[6] tackling some of the original critiques against memes as art. NFTs have since broken into typical art spaces, including art by ‘Beeple’ having been sold for amounts up to $70 million at famous auction houses known primarily for traditional art, such as Christies.^[7] However, critics continue to question their “lasting cultural relevance” and question why collectors should pay significant amounts of money to purchase something that can be easily accessed online, suggesting that their popularity is a bubble.^[8]

Meme art builds upon these critiques by completing the translation from digital pieces back to real world artifacts, bridging the divide between digital memes and art.^[9] Early versions involved simply the memorialization of characters famous from memes as sculptures in recognition of their popularity, such as a statue of Istanbul's famous ‘Meme Cat’ known as ‘Tombili’ being placed in the same location as the cat in the original meme following the subject's death.^[10] Since then, artists like ‘Meetissai’ have produced other pieces that take pictures that have gone viral for their unique perspective or imagery and rendered them in sculpture.^[11]

Characteristics

Typical features of meme art derive from memes in general and include:

Appropriation and remix: formal reuse of existing images, templates, or captions, such as classical paintings having text captions that recontextualize the image^[12]

Variation and seriality: creation of multiple related versions or iterations, similarly to how memes are repeatedly marginally iterated upon to make new versions^[13]

Participatory authorship: collaborative production, reposting, and transformation by audiences; ability for the audience to participate more directly in the art akin to mediums like performance art^[14]

Context-dependence: meaning shaped by platform conventions, community knowledge, and timely references, ironically causing pieces to often be interpreted more “accurately” by people not in the art world rather than vice-versa. This also leads to the meaning of pieces being more fluid as the perception of the meme changes over time in the online space.^[15]

Circulation as form: distribution routes (screenshots, reposts, edits) treated as part of the work's meaning

Themes

Themes that are common in meme art include:

Contrast between “high art” and “low art”: Several meme art pieces highlight the absurdity of placing internet memes into traditional “high art” contexts, such as museums.^[16]

Inside jokes and the reversal of typical art roles: Meme art often expresses ideas that may appear to be typical art to people that are unaware of its origins, but has an additional layer for people that are familiar with the source of the memes. This serve to draw attention to meme art as a medium of the average person, rather than gated behind artistic expertise.^[17]

Ephemerality vs Permanence: One of the central principles of memes is the idea that they are expected to be fleeting, whether through scrolling or ongoing remixing. Meme art attempts to increase the permanence of the base meme, locking the character or idea into one form as a piece of art.^[18]

Criticisms

Ownership: Since the original source of many memes cannot be traced accurately, critics question whether meme artists can really claim ownership over characters in art pieces, or if they are a form of theft or plagiarism.^[19]

Appropriation and Consent: Since several memes involve real people or entities who have usually not consented to their image being used in such a way, criticisms regarding consent have emerged, questioning whether the original subjects are entitled to some form of compensation.^[20]

Slop / “Brain-Rot”: Critics suggest that meme art is a gimmick that has only gained prominence because of reduced attention spans and the “tiktokification” of younger generations, and that it will not have lasting impact as something else becomes the centre of public attention.^[21]